


Standing On The Outside Looking In

by inqwex



Category: The Librarians (TV 2014)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-06
Updated: 2017-02-08
Packaged: 2018-09-22 10:12:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,617
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9603446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inqwex/pseuds/inqwex
Summary: Or how Stone, Cassandra, Ezekiel, and Jenkins realised that Eve and Flynn had 'A Thing'





	1. The First To Notice

**Author's Note:**

> I'm so intrigued into how/when the LITs and Jenkins found out about Eve and Flynn. There's a weird lack of reaction to it. This is my take.

"So," Stone set the two cold beers down on the table, interrupting Eve's amused spectating of Jones and Cassandra's game of pool. Cassandra's internal math gave her an obvious edge, but Ezekiel had clearly spent a lot of time in bars winning money on the game.

"So," Eve parrotted with a smile.

"You and Dr Carsen must have seen some things," Stone said conversationally, taking a swig of his beer.

Eve smiled, looking down. "Not really," she admitted, worrying at the label on her beer bottle with her thumb nail. "Uh, finding you guys was kind of our first mission."

Jake's beer halted partway to his mouth. "Really?" From their general sort of ease with each other, he'd assumed they'd been working together a while.

Eve shrugged and nodded.

"We'd met before that," she felt compelled to add. "I...er...I was in Berlin, with my team, and he showed up out of a old tunnel or something. He unearthed some sort of magic chest hidden by Nazis..."

"Let me guess, a dozen zombie Nazis came out of the woodwork?" Jake joked.

The Colonel smiled at him.

"Not quite. My team and I were already under fire from a more...conventional opponent. He did set off some kind of booby trap on the chest though. One of the gunmen had set a WMD to blow at the same time, so he was disarming the chest while I was disarming the bomb. Well, actually, he was also kind of telling me how to disarm the WMD."

"Well you guys make a good team," Stone said lightly.

"Yeah, well," Baird half-smiled and looked down at her beer again, returning to shredding the label with her fingernail.

Jake frowned. He didn't know her particularly well, but she seemed almost nervous? Weirdly shy? The Colonel reminded him a lot of his little sister Jenny. It was probably because they were both military; Jenny was in the Marine Corps and had that same kind of air.

Suddenly, looking at the slight flush on her face and small uptick of her mouth, it clicked.

"You like him," he said in surprise, pointing the beer bottle at her.

"What? I mean," her head shot up, and her words were reflexively defensive.

"It's okay," Jake said hurriedly. "I mean, I'm pretty sure it's not against any rules or anything."

 "It's not, I mean, it's not like that," she said at the same time.

He tilted his head, and grinned at her, and she blushed.

"Okay, maybe it is a bit like that," she muttered.

"Huh," he said, leaning back and taking another swig of beer.

She looked up, head slightly tilted to one side and teeth worrying her bottom lip.

"Look, could we maybe, just keep this between us? I just..."

"Sure," Jake cut her off. "It's fine, Colonel. I really don't think anyone will care."

"Call me Eve, or Baird," she said after a long moment, flashing him a thankful grin.

"Sure, Baird," Jake said easily. "So, counterterrorism?"

 "Sorry sailor," she said with a grin. "If I told you, I'd have to kill you."

 "Can't blame a guy for trying," he shrugged.


	2. In Which Ezekiel Jones Feels Like An Idiot

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for your lovely feedback!
> 
> Bit of a longer chapter, because Ezekiel's a bit slower than Stone at picking up on things outside himself but I hope you enjoy it.

"How's it going there?" the Colonel was attempting to keep the situation calm, but it really wasn't working.

"Hurry up!" yelled Stone.

Yeah, that didn't help, Ezekiel couldn't help but think to himself.

He turned back to the door in front of them. It was covered in weird, rune things that Stone had said were Old Saxon. Unfortunately, Stone needed to help the Colonel hold the door against the thing that was currently trying to eat them. Not to mention, for a guy that was supposedly an arts/history/languages whiz, Stone sure was slow at translating.

"There must be a pattern," Cassandra mused, doing her hands-flung-out thing.

There was no obvious locking mechanism that Ezekiel could see, but the door handle wouldn't budge. Like, at all.

Suddenly, a ring tone sounded through the small room.

"What the hell?" grunted Stone.

"Who has reception down here?" 

"It's my phone," the Colonel sounded surprised. "Ezekiel, can you get it please? Maybe Jenkins has found a way to contact us?"

Ezekiel plucked it from her pocket.

"It's Flynn," he said. He wasn't sure why he was surprised, after all the Guardian and the Librarian would presumably communicate...but he was kinda surprised.

"Answer it," Baird growled.

Ezekiel shrugged. "Okay," he said. "Hello, this is Colonel Baird's phone, you're speaking with the great Ezekiel Jones."

"Jones?" Carsen's voice was very quiet, but the surprise was clear. "What's happened? Where's Eve?"

"She and Stone are currently holding the door against a rampaging monster that wants to eat us," Ezekiel said in his most nonchalant voice.

"Is he okay?" hissed Baird. Ezekiel frowned at her.

"Is he okay, are we okay?" Ezekiel said, gesturing around the room.

"Got it!" Cassandra trilled triumphantly, reaching out to touch a single rune. The door began glowing and shifted.

"Okay, you three in," Baird ordered.

"But-" Stone started to object. Ezekiel could have told him that would be a waste of time, but he was too busy listening to Flynn babbling on.

"Sorry, mate, you're gonna have to repeat that," he said, stepping through the door into a small, dark room.

"What's going on? Where are you?"

"We're hunting for Hrunting," Ezekiel said proudly.

"There's a den of GRENDELS there!" Flynn just about exploded.

"Woah, chill, mate. Everyone's fine," Ezekiel winced as he saw Baird propel through the door. A clawed hand reached through after her, ripping into her forearm as Stone slammed the door shut.

"Everyone's fine except for Colonel Baird," Ezekiel amended, as she cradled the bloody arm against her and joined Stone to slam the door shut. As it got closer to the doorframe, suddenly that glowy thing happened again and the door seemed to almost melt shut, sending the clawed hand to the ground.

"WHAT?!" Flynn just about exploded. Ezekiel winced, holding the phone away from his ear. In the quiet cavern, his shouting echoed tinnily through the phone's tiny speaker.

"Helpful, Ezekiel," growled Stone. "Give the phone to Baird and come help me wrap up her arm. I don't think that thing will get through, so we should take a minute now."

Ezekiel handed the phone over.

"Flynn? Are you okay?" she sounded worried. "No I'm fine, it's just a scratch. Are you okay?"

Colonel Baird never sounded worried like that. It was weird. Also, her arm was more than just a scratch - three long furrows had been raked in her skin and from the look of them, there was something toxic in the venom. Stone had already emptied the medkit water over it, with no real effect. They needed to get back to the Annex.

"You guys, I think we found it," Cassandra's words interrupted Ezekiel's train of thought. He looked up to see her shining the light onto a boat in the middle of the cavern, in which a suit of armour lay, a great big sword by its side.

"Well, we might be able to use your advice, so I'll put you on speaker," Baird clicked a button and held the phone up.

"So the Clipping Book sent you after Hrunting?" Flynn's voice sounded again from the speakers, more audibly this time. "That barrow's been sealed for centuries, it was pretty secure, never thought anyone would open - but I suppose with the Serpent Brotherhood on the loose they could conceivably - I mean, it's supposed to open, the barrow, at a specific time, but they could try - they use magic where we don't-"

"That's all cool, mate, but just to recap, we've locked ourselves into a tomb with a boat and a creepy suit of armour and a sword with a ravenous beast outside," Ezekiel tried to stop the rambling.

"Well, Baird's got reception," Stone pointed out. "We can just grab it and call Jenkins for a door."

"It can't be that easy," Baird frowned. "There must be a trap."

"Actually," Flynn cleared his voice somewhat. "She doesn't have reception."

"Flynn?" there was a warning note in Baird's tone.

"I'm sort of using a communication stone," Flynn replied meekly. "I have to wait for sunset to complete the ritual - anyway. I was just sort of sitting around waiting-"

"You called Baird because you were bored?" Ezekiel asked incredulously.

Boy was he going to be in for it. Ezekiel grinned, waiting for Baird to chew him out about interrupting a mission.

"Well, any suggestions as to how we get past Grendel's ... whatever relation?" Baird asked instead, shooting Stone a glare as he smirked at her.

Wait what?

Hang on.

That was  _also_ weird.

The weirdness that was this entire phone call with Flynn started to make an even weirder kind of sense.

As Flynn babbled on about some sort of mistranslation and how it was the armour they should be more interested in, Ezekiel sidled up to Stone.

"Wait, are they hooking up?" he asked incredulously.

"Umm..." Stone stalled.

"How long has this been going on?" Ezekiel whispered, amusement creeping into his tone.

"I don't know if it is going on," Stone gave in.

"They so have a thing," Ezekiel pointed at the phone. "Flynn called her. In the middle of a mission. She didn't get mad. They are so worried about each other."

"Don't say anything to her about it, okay," Stone hissed.

"On the down-low, got it," Ezekiel nodded. "How do you know?"

"Lucky guess," Stone replied. "She was being all weird and, well, she blushed. When we were talking about him."

Ezekiel grinned. 

"This is going to be so much fun to watch," he said. He was going to need popcorn.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beowulf is what you may want to look up.


	3. Out of Practice

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jenkins is a bit of a harder voice to capture, but I hope this rings true.

He's not the last to know, but Jenkins also realises with a wince that he probably should have noticed before this.

It wasn't the way in which Colonel Baird raced to him as Mr Carsen came flying through the door, covered in blood and screaming in a way that had the whole room go suddenly grimly quiet.

It wasn't the way in which she ordered Mr Stone to help her carry him to the small room off the entry to the Annex they'd set aside for injuries, nor even the way Mr Carsen had immediately slumped into her arms.

The look in her eyes as she stitched up the flay marks on his back - after all, a hospital would ask questions, and as Mr Carsen had pointed out after some analgesia, they had a limited supply of healing artefacts - should have been a clue.

No, as he stops cold in the doorway, it turns out that it took seeing them in bed together for him to realise that they fancied each other.

It's not uncommon for Colonel Baird to stay with an injured Librarian overnight in the sick room. Not two weeks ago she'd stayed up all night with a concussed Ezekiel Jones, waking him every two hours.

She's always in the chair next to the bed, though, not _in_ the bed.

It's perfectly innocent; they're both fully dressed except for Mr Carsen's shirt - although the bandages on his back probably approximate one. She's lying on her back on top of the covers, shoes having neatly placed at the bottom of the bed. Mr Carsen is, of course, lying on his stomach, his face pressed into her shoulder, and arm draped across her waist.

Suddenly he feels voyeuristic. He takes a step back, reaching for the door handle. He's sure that they wouldn't want the Three Musketeers intruding on this scene.

Somehow, she stirs, and her look of alarm is clear even in the dim light as she spots him in the hall.

_Sorry_ , Jenkins mouths, acutely uncomfortable, moving to close the door but she shakes her head, and gently, tenderly, disengages herself from the snoring Librarian.

She steps into the hallway, her hair a golden, messy halo amid the brighter hallway lights.

"Jenkins-" she begins in an urgent hiss, colour high in her cheeks.

"I didn't mean to intrude," he interrupts quickly, feeling the colour rise in his own face. "I just came to check on him."

He's loathe to admit it, but he's quite fond of Mr Carsen, despite how much the young Librarian's approach worries him. Being old sometimes grants the ability to notice uncomfortable parallels, and Mr Carsen reminds him so much of someone he's worked very hard on forgetting.

"It's not, I mean, we're -" she's clearly flustered, and Jenkins smiles indulgently at her, going so far as to lay a hand on her forearm.

"We're a Library, not the military, Colonel," he says reassuringly. "There are no rules against that sort of thing here. You understand why there often are rules, but I think there's not too many more things dangerous in this world than forbidden love. So, here, we don't have rules on whom you can love."

"Love?" her panic is slightly different now, and Jenkins holds back a chuckle as she glances into the room at the stirring Librarian with a look of dawning comprehension. 

"Or whatever kids this days call it. I believe Mr Jones uses the term, 'booty call'?" he teases, receiving a glare for his efforts.

"We haven't even been on a date yet!" she objects.

"Eve?" now Mr Carsen is blinking groggily at them. Jenkins had given him a stiff dose of painkillers, and quite frankly, he's somewhat surprised he's this awake. He suspects the Librarian won't remember any of this in the morning.

"Go back to bed, Colonel Baird," Jenkins says kindly. "I'll make sure you're not disturbed."

"Jenkins, I -" she sighs, and leans forward, pressing a kiss to his cheek. He stiffens in surprise. "Thank you."

"Good night, Colonel," he says, smiling uncomfortably at her.

"Good night, Jenkins."

He pulls the door closed behind her, but lingers a moment to hear a sleepy question and a quiet reassuring murmur.

Jenkins might be a little out of practice with people, but if that's not love then, he reflects with bittersweet yearning, he's possibly never known what love is.

He's not feeling particularly tired, yet, so perhaps he might work in the main room, and head off any of the curious children that might wander down.

 


	4. The Last To Know

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Poor Cassandra, she needs something pretty obvious.

Cassandra liked how quiet the Annex was in the mornings. Jenkins was often there, quietly moving around, but he rarely interrupted her. (Jenkins didn't count anyway, Cassandra wasn't even sure if he needed to sleep).

It was her quiet time. Her opportunity to have the first look at the Clipping Book and to pull out her early work on mathemagics (it was going to be a thing). Only this morning, she could hear quiet voices. She frowned, slowing her pace as she listened in more intently.

A laugh broke out, and she felt herself relax as she recognised it as belonging to Eve, followed by what was indisputably Flynn's voice. (You never know, it was only last week that Morgan Le Fay had broken in! Jenkins had been quite unsettled by that, for some reason that he and Baird only seemed to know).

She picked up her pace again, eager to see Flynn. He'd been gone for a while, since he'd healed from the awful back wounds. That had been an awful week or so - he healed remarkably quickly - but everyone, particularly the Colonel had been somewhat subdued. She'd seen the data herself on Librarians and how long they lasted (she couldn't help herself) and Flynn was indeed an outlier. Most Librarians lasted less than four years in the job - the majority died within a few months, even with a Guardian. She'd been somewhat reassured to see that not  _all_ of them had died or gone evil (okay, just most of them). Some had retired! But Flynn was still going, more than ten years later, and most of the time he hadn't had anyone to help him.

What hadn't been recorded in the book was how close he often came. From how matter-of-fact he had been about whatever had happened in northern Estonia, she suspected he came close a lot. 

Cassandra rounded the corner...and let out an involuntary shriek. She immediately clapped her hands over her mouth, but it was enough to cause Flynn and Eve to jump back from each other.

"Cassandra," Flynn waved one hand about, flailing for casualness. "Um, hi?"

"What's going on?" Ezekiel rounded the corner in a rush upon hearing the scream. "Oh, Flynn's back. Hi, Flynn."

"Eep," was all Cassandra could say.

"Um," Flynn said as he waved awkwardly, before looking at Eve who flushed slightly, but she rounded on Ezekiel.

"Jones! What are you doing here so early in the morning?"

"Well, I had a raid last night-" 

"A computer game thing," Cassandra interrupted helpfully, looking at the blank expressions on Eve and Flynn's faces.

"-And we only just wrapped up. Man, that second boss is a killer," Ezekiel shook his head sadly. Nobody quite knew what to say to that, although Cassandra suspected that Baird was holding back a comment about all night gaming. There was a long moment of silence, before Ezekiel's eyebrows furrowed.

"So, what is going on?" a hint of mischief crept into his voice.

"Nothing," Eve and Cassandra said simultaneously, far too quickly.

"Right," Ezekiel was grinning openly now. Cassandra narrowed her eyes at him, unsure whether or not he  _knew_ what was going on, or was just being annoying. It was probably a 50:50 shot, she calculated. The thief had an irritating habit of seeming to know what was going on. He had a terrible tendency to eavesdrop.

"Nice lipstick, Flynn," he said, cheerfully, before turning and wandering back out.

Flynn went bright red, and quickly swiped at his mouth.

"Look, Cass, it's not...we weren't..." Eve stopped, looking helplessly at Flynn.

"It's not that we meant to keep you in the dark it's just...we didn't...it's not..." he stammered on from her.

"It's just a thing?" Eve said, voice going strangely high as she looked uncertainly at Flynn.

 "Yeah, a thing," Flynn's voice was unusually deep and warm as he looked right back at Eve who blushed again.

Cassandra felt her annoyance fading. It was really quite cute, and she clapped her hands in delight inadvertently.

The two of them looked back over, startling a little, before going right back to looking acutely uncomfortable. Eve picked something up from their shared desk to fiddle with.

"I'd better -" Flynn started, pointing at the door. "Um, bye Cassandra?"

"Bye, Flynn," Cassandra waved.

"I'll see you?" he paused at the door's threshold to look back at Eve.

"Come back alive, Librarian," Eve said fondly as he threw her a sloppy salute and raced through the back door.

Cassandra beamed as she looked at Eve, who just seemed to go even redder.

"I, um, look," the usually unflappable Colonel started the sentence half a dozen times.

"He's cute," Cassandra interrupted. Baird raised her eyebrows. "I mean, he's way too old for me, but he's the right age for you - not that you're old - it's just, well, I can see it. And I don't know him all that well, he hasn't been around much, but he..."

Cassandra paused. She really didn't usually like to bring this up. "He was very nice about, the, um, Cal thing."

Eve smiled gently at her. "Yeah, I think that's just how Flynn is, Red."

Cassandra smiled gratefully at her. 

"So," Baird said. "What are you working on at the moment?"

Cassandra allowed her the unsubtle change in subject, and brought her out to the workroom.


	5. On the Inside Looking Out

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoy this last chapter :)

“All right,” Eve sighed as she hung up the phone, looking at her wet, and decidedly dishevelled Librarians. “Jenkins said it’ll take him a few hours to fix the door.”

Flynn winced. “Oops,” he offered. “How mad was he?”

Eve couldn’t help but smirk at him. “At me? Not at all. At the rest of you…”

The four shuffled a little, looking at each other nervously.

“Well, we got the thing and shut it down,” Ezekiel said defensively.

“How were we to know that the blast would go-“ Cassandra used her hands to illustrate, “poof like that? Or interrupt Mr Jenkins’ door?”

“What’s done is done,” Stone said. “But we could all really use a change of clothes and a shower.”

“Sleep too,” Jones put in hastily. “I’m buggered.”

Everyone paused to look at him for a long moment.

“Tired,” Jones flung his hands up in the air in exasperation. Just as Eve thought she had heard all of his Australian phrases he came out with another piece of weird slang.

“No disagreement here, bucko,” Eve said, wrinkling her nose. She’d gotten separated from the others, and hadn’t therefore gone swimming to quite the same extent.

“It’s Carnivale on Venice, we’re unlikely to find anything,” Flynn said with a sigh.

Eve grinned at him, and fished her badge out of her jacket pocket. “This usually helps.” 

* * *

 

And it did. Just not as much as Eve would have hoped, as the five of them stood in the doorway of the hotel room they’d been assigned. She’d gone through five hotels before this one had said they had a room. (This hotel had rung a handful of others, looking in trepidation at the five adults who needed a room - in Venice - during Carnivale. They seemed to have the only room left on the island, and they'd already missed the last boat).

“I’m sorry, this is all we can do,” the manager apologised.

“That’s okay,” Eve said with a bracing smile. “We know you’re full up.”

The manager smiled gratefully, and hurried back downstairs.

The five of them glanced at each other, and back at the room.

Like all European hotel rooms, the room was tiny. The hotel staff had creatively managed to slot in two little pallet beds and a couch around a double bed, but they would all have to pick their way carefully through the room – and whoever ended up sleeping in the entrance way would have to put up with people stepping over them all night to get to the bathroom.

“I bags the couch,” Ezekiel said immediately, racing over to put his plastic bag of clean clothes down on it. (While they’d waited for the hotel to make up a room, they’d all taken turns to go out and buy some clean clothes, Flynn twitching oddly as they did so. He hadn’t elaborated on why he was so jumpy, merely muttering the word ‘receipts’ to her. From Eve's brief interactions with Charlene, she figured she got it).

The tension broke momentarily.

“Of all the things you choose to ‘bag’,” Jake said, doing air quotes with his hands. “You chose the _couch_? And not the bed next to the bathroom so you don't have to worry about needing to go in the middle of the night?”

“Mate, I’m the king of couch-surfing,” Ezekiel said confidently. 

"Ew, who wants to be woken in the middle of the night by other people going to the toilet? No definitely this one for me,” Cassandra said decisively, picking her way through the room to the little cot bed on the floor next to the double bed. “I always _hated_ sharing with my cousins.”

She paused, then added for emphasis with a shudder, “ _Hated_.”

Eve blinked, glancing at Flynn, a little flustered at how quickly and easily they'd been left the double bed. He looked equally taken aback.

"Um," she opened her mouth to say something and then stopped, unsure what she even wanted to say. (Beyond  _this is weird and awkward_ ).

“Look, obviously two people have to share,” Stone said. “Cassandra isn’t keen on it-”

“Hate it!” the young woman chirped, before adding quickly, "We're all aware of Fleve, it's fine."

" _Fleve_?" Flynn sounded appalled, and Eve couldn't help but look at him incredulously. "Why would you go with  _Fleve_ when you could use Evlynn, which is actually sort of a name, or Caird, or Bairsen - that sounds fairly badass actually."

"Flynn!" Eve wasn't proud of how that came out more as a shriek. Stone laughed at her and Eve shot him a glare.

"Right, sorry, not helping," Flynn acknowledged, before quickly muttering, " _Fleve_? Seriously?"

“My idea,” Ezekiel announced proudly. "It's pithy. Anyway, as Cassandra said, it's fine. Just keep all the mushy stuff down, okay?”

“Jones!” she exclaimed, caught off guard. The boy simply grinned unapologetically at her. Flynn placed a warm hand at her lower back.

“Well, I guess we just take our turns in the shower and then head to dinner,” he said.

“At least we’re dry, but we still can’t sit down anywhere,” Cassandra noted, wrinkling her nose.

“Well, let's wait in the lobby while each one of us takes shifts in the shower," Flynn suggested pragmatically. "Come and get us when you’ve showered and we’ll switch,” Flynn said. Eve was too taken aback to do anything other than let him gently guide her to the lifts while the other three Librarians started arguing over who showered first. “Eve, it’s fine,” he said gently.

“Why are you so calm about this?” she asked urgently, trying to work out why she was so weirded out by it. Maybe it was the implication that they all knew that she and Flynn were now sharing a bed?

“Look, they all obviously know,” Flynn said. “It’s not a big deal. Ezekiel’s right – if Cassandra won’t share with you, then it is the logical thing. Unless…unless you don’t…if so that’s okay…”

“No, of course I do,” Eve hissed as the elevator beeped. She ran her hand through her hair as they entered. “It’s just a bit weird.”

He smiled reassuringly, eyes warm.

“Yeah,” he said, nudging her shoulder with hers. She smiled back at him, finally relaxing enough to lean against him and let their fingers intertwine. "Done with your mini-freak out?"

"I was not freaking out!" she objected. 

Flynn raised an eyebrow. 

"Okay, maybe a bit," she sighed. "It's not you, it's just...I kind of liked it being our thing."

"I know," Flynn said simply, squeezing her hand.

In what seemed like a whirl, all five of them had showered, dinner had passed in a blur, and it wasn’t until they were all climbing into bed that Eve realised that her awkwardness has dissipated enough for her to roll to face Flynn and stretch an arm across his stomach. He gently brushed his lips across her temple, and Eve fell asleep to the sounds of Jake’s soft snores from the doorway.

* * *

 Flynn woke suddenly in the night to sharp, irregular little breaths from Eve.

“Eve?” he barely whispered, tightening the arm around her waist.

She had nightmares even more often than he did. It worried him; she always told him what the nightmare was, but only ever in broad strokes. He’d been working hard on being scrupulously honest with his own nightmares, which seemed to help her open up.

“Eve,” he tried again, but without success as she restlessly shifted.

Normally, at home – really, at Eve’s, and maybe he should fix that except that maybe was being a bit too forward and the middle of the night in Venice wasn’t the best place to start wondering about that – he would have turned on the light, but here, he was conscious of the three sleeping Librarians in the room with them.

“Eve,” he whispered, a little more urgently this time, rubbing a hand down her back.

The snoring abruptly stopped.

“Everything okay?” Stone said blearily.

“Flynn,” Eve gasped, finally stilling and opening her eyes. Even in the dark he could see the sweat gleaming on her forehead and the frantic way her eyes darted about.

“Hey,” he said, brushing hair from her face. “There you are.”

She flung herself at his neck, still breathing shallowly and rapidly, clinging to him as if for dear life.

“Baird?” Stone grunted, more awake now, and clearly concerned.

“What’s going on?” Ezekiel’s head popped up over the back of the couch.

Cassandra remained mercifully asleep.

Flynn hesitated, unsure what to say, but Eve was completely still, wound as tight as he’d ever felt her.

“Nightmare,” he replied to the boys shortly.

“Need anything?” Ezekiel offered awkwardly. “Water?”

Flynn felt Eve shake her head in his neck.

“No, go back to sleep,” he said, more gently. “She’ll be okay.”

Stone grunted and almost immediately, his soft snores started up again. Ezekiel kept his head up a bit longer, but after a few minutes, he too dropped his head back down.

Flynn lay awake for a long while, rubbing circles on her back. Finally, she seemed to take a deep breath and relax.

“Sorry,” she murmured.

“Don’t be silly,” Flynn replied, snaking the hand up to the back of her neck and pressing a quick kiss to her mouth, pulling her closer to him. She came willingly, curling against his side. He drifted off eventually, aware from her breathing and unconscious drawing on his chest that she was still awake.

* * *

 The next time he woke up was to the sound of a toilet being flushed and quiet voices murmuring. Eve was draped across him, face in his neck, and a long leg between his. Flynn peered over the side of the bed, doing his best not to jostle her.

Stone and Cassandra were murmuring quietly to each other, sat on the edge of their respective pallets. Ezekiel exited the bathroom, carefully avoiding stepping on Stone.

“Morning,” Stone said quietly, the first to notice Flynn was awake.

“Morning,” Flynn replied softly.

“She okay?” Cassandra turned to look at him with big eyes. One of the boys must have told her what happened.

“Yeah, don’t think she slept well after though,” Flynn answered honestly.

“Jenkins says the door’s going to take a bit longer,” Stone said. “Anyway, we thought we would go out for breakfast, see Venice a bit more in daylight, let you two sleep.”

Flynn nodded, unsure what he was supposed to say. The three seemed to be looking at him expectantly. He felt a little weird about having them staring at him while he and Eve, quite clearly, were tangled up rather intimately together in bed.

(Still, it would be good to get rid of them. He needed to go to the bathroom, and ... well ... it wasn't his fault; Eve  _was_ draped across him like a second blanket and ... well ... actually, thinking about them being in the room was helping with that particular problem).

“Got your phones?” he asked, figuring that was the first question Eve would have for him.

“Yes, Dad,” Ezekiel rolled his eyes, but held his phone up. Flynn glared at him without effect.

“We’ll catch you up,” Flynn assured them, and let his head fall back against the pillow. He waited until the footsteps had faded completely before he carefully wormed his way out from under Eve. She merely mumbled, groping towards the warm space he left in the bed and he felt a spark of worry. She was usually a very very light sleeper - she must have only just drifted off.

He emptied his bladder, washed his hands, and with a shrug, crawled back into bed to half-sit against the headboard. He reached for his book (he always had a book), and opened it up to the right page. Eve unconsciously wormed her way back to him, curling against him again, and Flynn reflected that he couldn't remember the last time he felt this content.

About half an hour later, according to the hotel alarm clock, Eve started to stir.

“Morning, sunshine,” he said with a hint of teasing.

“Morning,” she said absently, leaning forward to kiss him on the lips before she froze. “Where are the kids?”

“Breakfast,” Flynn replied.

“They have their phones?” Eve asked. Flynn nodded.

“Ezekiel called me Dad,” he said, making a face. Eve laughed.

“Want to talk about it?” he asked, gently stroking her back. Eve shrugged.

“Nothing major, just … an ambush in Kuwait. Three of my team didn’t make it.”

“I’m sorry,” he said earnestly. Her face softened, and she reached out a hand to trace his cheek, bright blue eyes looking deep into him.

“Thank you,” she said, kissing him again.

“Mmmm,” he murmured as their lips disengaged.

“The door?” she asked, untangling herself from him and sitting up to lean against the headboard next to him. He draped an arm around her shoulders.

“Jenkins is working on it,” he assured her. “But while we’re here, in Venice, we might as well look around.”

She looked at him with mock concern. “Who are you and what have you done with Flynn Carsen?”

He made a face at her. “I can do sight-seeing.”

“You do it badly,” she said with a grin.

The words had been burning in his throat for a while now, and looking at her with her golden hair and bright blue eyes and big smile, they couldn’t be contained any longer.

“I love you, Eve Baird” he said, with forced casualness.

Her eyes widened with surprise, before her hands suddenly grasped his cheeks and pulled him towards her, lips colliding.

“I guess that’s a good sign, right,” he said breathlessly, a while later. She smiled at him, as the door handle rattled.

Eve ignored it, gently touching his cheek.

“I love you too, Flynn Carsen,” she said, moments before the three Librarians spilled back into the room.

“Sorry,” Stone had already started to whisper before stopping. “Oh, you’re awake.”

"Yeah," Eve said. Flynn tried not to look too smug.

“You okay?” Cassandra asked, rummaging in the plastic bag and triumphantly pulling out a toothbrush.

“I’m fine,” Eve replied. “How was breakfast?”


End file.
